Understanding and Coping With Anxiety Stomach Pain

Anxiety is a shockingly complex disorder, and one can completely change your body's chemistry. The stress that anxiety puts on your body can lead to a host of different issues. One of the most common is stomach pain.

Stomach pain, stomach cramping, and intestinal discomfort that is hard to describe can all be the result of persistent anxiety. In fact, there are even some health conditions that are anxiety based.

Stomach Pain = Anxiety?

Stomach pain often occurs when you have a virus, or when you've eaten something that isn't sitting well. But stomach pain may be the result of anxiety, especially if that anxiety causes a great deal of stress or tension.

To better understand if your stomach pain may be anxiety, you need to see how your anxiety affects you.

Diagnosing Anxiety Stomach Pain

Stomach pain caused by anxiety is difficult for doctors to diagnose, because the pain and indigestion is still a real physical response – the same type of response from your body that would occur if you had a health issue.

I developed an anxiety test a while back to help people understand their anxiety better, as well as how to treat it. So if you haven't already, take the 7 minute test right now.

If the stomach pain is severe, or accompanied by fever or other symptoms, it's certainly a good idea to visit a doctor. But anxiety can genuinely cause stomach pain in a way that not just mimics – but actually causes some digestion and pain problems.

Examples of Anxiety Related Stomach Issues

There are numerous issues caused by anxiety that could affect the sensations in your stomach. Some examples are:

Abdominal Tension Stress tends to cause a great deal of tension in the abdomen. That tension can tire out abdominal muscles and squeeze organs in a way that creates a feeling of ache or pain.

Digestion Stress affects hormone levels, and hormones are used to aid digestion. When you're stressed, your body's hormones start to cause your digestion to suffer, which may lead to bloating, intestinal pain, and more.

Irritable Bowel Syndrome Anxiety has been linked as one of the most likely causes of irritable bowel syndrome, or IBS. IBS occurs when your body's gastrointestinal system is no longer processing foods correctly, and it can cause stomach discomfort even without anxiety present.

Anxiety also releases epinephrine, which causes the body to produce extra levels of stomach acid. That acidity causes the lining in the esophagus to become irritated, and this can lead to not only stomach pain, but also nausea and vomiting. These are just a few of the ways that anxiety can cause some type of pain or negative stomach sensations.

Stomach Pain and Long Term Health

Because of the extra acids in your stomach and the changes to the way your body processes nutrients, the stomach pain from anxiety can actually be a problem if left untreated. Stomach ulcers, for example, are often the result of long term stress. The acids within the stomach break down the gastric or intestinal lining and cause open wounds that may harm your health.

The pain itself is usually not a sign of danger, and generally does not mean that you have an ulcer. However, it is a sign that your stress is fairly powerful, and if you allow yourself to experience stress and stomach pain for an extended period of time, your risk of ulcers may increase.

When is Stomach Pain Most Likely to Occur?

If you have anxiety, stomach pain can occur at any time – even when no anxiety is present. However, many people experience stomach pain during panic attacks.

The exact link between an anxiety attack and stomach pain is not exactly clear, other than the fact that during a panic attack your body is under a considerable amount of stress and your hormones are often on overdrive. In addition, those with anxiety attacks are prone to hyperventilation, which may lead to bloating which can cause its own stomach pain.

Are There Foods That Reduce Stomach Pain?

Anxiety related stomach pain is not usually the result of your diet (although there are some diet and sedentary lifestyles may increase the risk of anxiety), so there aren't necessarily any dietary changes that can help reduce stomach pain.

That said, those with panic attacks are more prone to experiencing more severe stomach discomfort, even when no anxiety is present. In other words, when you have panic attacks, it's possible to have stomach pain even without a panic attack.

In addition, those with anxiety attacks and severe anxiety are prone to what's known as "over-sensitization." That means that they are more likely to notice and feel smaller, normal changes in the body, and these can actually trigger an anxiety attack. So if your diet does contain foods that cause you gas, stomach discomfort, or mild indigestion, it may be best to avoid them because the slight amount of discomfort could feel worse than it should, and may trigger a panic attack.

That's why healthy eating in those that get stomach pain with anxiety is important. Make sure you're getting:

Fruits

Vegetables

Water/Hydration

Whole-Grain Carbohydrates

Also, if possible, try to avoid eating until you're too full. Those with severe anxiety sometimes interpret the "full" feeling as pain, and this could trigger a panic attack and further pain.

Wide Range of Symptoms

One of the more amazing issues with some types of anxiety disorder are the way that they change sensations in our body. For example, for many, feeling full is a nice feeling. However, it can lead to a variety of natural body sensations, including:

Feeling lightheaded.

Slight stomach discomfort.

Fatigue

In those without anxiety, those are a natural feeling. In those with some types of anxiety, those sensations feel much more pronounced, and can trigger a full blown panic attack.

How to Relieve Stomach Pain Symptoms

There isn't necessarily a cure for the stomach pain symptoms themselves. When your body is under stress, your stomach tends to hurt as a result based on the acids in your stomach and the foods you've already eaten. If you have stomach pain as a result of an anxiety attach, you may need to wait it out.

Water can help a little, however. So consider sipping cool (but not too cold) water. Antacids may also be beneficial in some cases, but if you have stomach pain often you may not want to depend on antacid treatments.

In general, the only true way to cure stomach pain is to cure your anxiety. In the past, when I've worked with people that suffer from stomach pain, I start them off with this anxiety test I developed to figure out what types of anxiety they're suffering from and get to the root cause of how their anxiety is affecting them. So if you want to reduce your stomach pain, take my anxiety test now.

Need help with anxiety?

Then take our scientifically based anxiety test - completely free (takes no more than 7 minutes). After completing it, you will find out whether your anxiety is within "normal range," which parts are out of balance and, most importantly, how to proceed with beating your symptoms. It is made specifically for anxiety sufferers, please make use of it.

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